This Sunday’s game against St Johnstone could be in doubt due to the latest weather forecast for the Dundee area.
There are Yellow snow and ice warnings for the Dundee area for this Friday and Saturday.
According to the weather forecast for Leuchars rain will fall from 6am on Friday morning until 9pm on Sunday evening with snow falling on higher ground.
With the current drainage problems on Dens Park pitch it is likely that this Sunday’s game could be cancelled due to a waterlogged pitch.
Hopefully the outside contractors whoever they might be can work the oracle and get the pitch payable.
If the weather forecast for this weekend is correct hopefully the Club will arrange an early pitch inspection to avoid unnecessary journeys for out of town Dundee supporters.
It depends what weather forecast you look at. The BBC and Met Office forecasts are often at odds. For example this Sunday one says heavy rain the other light rain and sunny showers. It depends on what the outside contractors, aka the Burnley Ground Staff, can do to protect the pitch without major drainage improvements, who knows. The problem is there is heavy rain and there is heavy rain and also how localised it is. In addition to the lack of investment in the pitch we have so far this season had to cope with localised downpours that have played merry hell with a pitch susceptible to moderate to bad weather due to lack of investment. Twice so far this season we have had very localised extreme rain where different parts of Dundee experienced ludicrously different rainfall figures, e.g. the opening fixture which went ahead and the Aberdeen (h)
postponed fixture. On both these days the rain figures were bizarre. The weather stations at Myrekirk and the Ferry were wildly different in rainfall figures those days not just a few, even 10% difference but double the rain one area v the other. It just comes down to luck. With the state of our pitch it leaves little options for error. On a couple of occasions our pitch was unplayable due to the odd/extreme rainfall the Dump was unplayable too something that their support don't want to believe true and our support are unaware of.
Unfortunately due to the lack of investment in the drainage we are at the mercy of the weather and if unlucky with the timing of the rain bands you are right Islay Sunday's game could be in doubt. Hopefully we'd have retained the ability to host the game next midweek if postponed. There is of course the March cup weekend free for us and the Fermers to fall back on.
I understand that it is difficult for me to corroborate what I said about United's pitch for obvious reasons. In fact United were not away on either of the days you refer to having been playing the day before each time. The Motherwell game, however, was not one of the couple of games in question.
I have always been interested in studying the weather and from previous experience when you get a slow moving area of low pressure centred in England we get easterly winds and heavy rain.
It is also forecasted to be very windy with the wind coming from the east which is never a warm direction at any time of year in the Dundee area let alone during the winter months.
I set up my topic hoping that someone from the Club who are known to read what is being posted on Dundee supporters Internet forums might take steps to arrange an early inspection of the Dens Park pitch.
This will also save Greg Fenton bumping his gums if the match referee postpones the game an hour before the kickoff this Sunday afternoon.
I also study the Metcheck weather website which is usually good for the first seven days but after that their weather forecasting is a bit haphazard.
Metcheck tend to exaggerate the wind speeds on their website.
I have seen them forecasting gusts of wind of 90mph for the island of Islay in ten days time and the following day Metcheck have changed their weather forecast to gusts of wind of 40mph. Still windy but not nearly as bad as the 90mph winds forecast on their website the previous day.
Do you realise that this season we have been criticised for leaving the pitch inspection too late when in fact it was the referee's late arrival that was a major factor and also for calling off the game mid morning to be followed by fans on social media at 2 pm telling everyone how the weather was clear and questioning the early call off? In the latter case the pitch was clearly still not playable despite the improved weather but you get the gist of the problem. The SPFL tend to want to give as long as is reasonably possible to allow the game to take place.
Our poor pitch maintainance/investment makes it much more difficult to wait given that the drainage is so poor and consequently pitch recovery time lengthened. An early look would be appropriate but notwithstanding the pitch problematic of our own making it is/will be a difficult decision a to when to act regarding an inspection.